With more than 400,000 children in foster care in the United States, it's an issue that's not going away. Foster care is a temporary living arrangement for children who have been taken from their families as a result of abuse,…
Early into children’s services, Baptists trying to keep pace with changes
In the first decades following the Civil War when poverty shadowed widows and children of fallen soldiers in a dramatically disrupted South, Baptists and other Christian denominations started orphanages to care for them. Today, the South is dotted with campuses…
Mars Hill church pours itself into North Carolina county
MARS HILL, N.C. (ABP) — No one goes hungry in Madison County, North Carolina, for lack of effort by Mars Hill Baptist Church. Mars Hill Baptist, adjacent to Mars Hill College in the mountains of western North Carolina north of…
Zimbabwe Baptist seminary principal fired in faith statement dispute
GWERU, Zimbabwe (ABP) — The principal of the Baptist Theological Seminary of Zimbabwe — who has taught at Baptist divinity schools in Virginia and North Carolina — has been fired for refusing to accept changes made to the school’s governing…
Women in ministry pioneer seeks glimpses of holy as prison chaplain
ASHEVILLE, N.C. (ABP) — When Nancy Sehested finished her powerful sermon at the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of North Carolina state meeting in March, people were moved both by the message and to ask, “Where has she been?” As one of…
BWA expresses solidarity with Baptists in Norway after terror acts
FALLS CHURCH, Va. (ABP) — The head of the Baptist World Alliance has sent a letter of solidarity to Baptists in Norway in response to recent mass killings in that country that claimed at least 76 lives. Neville Callam, general…
Seeing America from across the seas
By David Gushee This is my first column in two months. My absence stems from many weeks on the road. I am still processing these experiences. With my daughter Marie, I spent two weeks in Cape Town, South Africa, helping…
Willing workers are drawn by passion, giftedness, calling
Tapping passion and giftedness — and an understanding of every job as ministry — may be the best way to find willing workers to fill those unglamorous and least-recognized posts in church life. Passion springs from a person’s gifts, according…
Womens’ mission dolls project introduce gospel around the world
MONROE, N.C. (ABP) — A single idea to make evangelistic dolls for children in other lands seeded an ecumenical project in North Carolina that has united women of many different churches to touch hearts worldwide. “We asked for an apple…